A Fair Exchange
by ImperialGirl
Summary: The Ghost crew steals a shuttle in a raid gone wrong and discovers they have an unexpected problem. Meanwhile Thrawn discovers the most precious thing in his collection has vanished. Related to MissKitsune0 8's "Freak Fleet" universe and my own fic "After Zero" (AO3 only for rating.) AU to my TIE Fighter stories here.


Fair Exchange

A/N: The crew of the Ghost stages a raid on a depot where the _Chimaera_ is taking on supplies, and they wind up with an unexpected problem. Meanwhile, Thrawn discovers the most precious piece in his collection has gone missing . . . . There are some Legends names in here as well. I prefer MissKitsune08's officer roster for _Chimaera_ 's crew.

There were far too many things about this mission that hadn't gone as expected. They hadn't expected the _Chimaera_ to be at the Imperial supply depot they were raiding for desperately-needed supplies after Atollon. They had _not_ expected Zeb and Kallus having to steal the Imperials' transport shuttle to escape.

And they _definitely_ did not expect to discover an extra passenger when the shuttle dropped out of hyperspace at their rendezvous point with the _Ghost_.

"Who _is_ she?" Ezra asked. The . . . prisoner? . . . was sitting on one of the supply crates in the _Ghost_ 's common room. She wore a plain gray Imperial jumpsuit, but her hair was definitely non-regulation and had come loose when Kallus had heard her spring from her hiding place in the shuttle, making a futile grab for the shuttle controls as he and Zeb made their getaway. He'd knocked her to the ground, sending the folded braid of long, blue-black hair tumbling down her back and her cap flying away. The delicately-sculpted features were clearly female, her build generally that of a near-human woman's, and her skin and hair . . . .

"Well, she's obviously the same species as Thrawn," Zeb said. "Whatever that is." The red eyes, faintly self-luminescent, blinked, but she didn't say anything.

"There are no other members of Thrawn's species in the Empire," Kallus objected. "She can't be from the _Chimaera_. ISB knows the crew of every ship in the fleet and I was aboard that ship more than once. There were no alien females aboard." The former ISB agent was standing, not because there were no places to sit but rather because he was nursing a bruised tailbone. Their uninvited guest had swept-kicked his feet from under him after he'd knocked her down and had been poised to deliver a much more telling kick when Zeb managed to get hold of her. The Lasat had told the story to Hera with perhaps more enthusiasm than was really charitable.

"Maybe Thrawn didn't have her there officially," Hera said, a dark suspicion in her tone. She crouched down so she was eye level with the prisoner, or guest, or whatever she turned out to be. "I'm Captain Hera Syndulla. This is my crew. If you're trying to escape the Empire, you're among friends here."

The alien woman looked up, and gave her a very thin smile. "I know who you are, Hera Syndulla," and while her accent was anything but Imperial, her pronunciation of the Twi'leki name was flawlessly native.

Just like Thrawn.

"I do not wish to be here. But if you think you can use me against him, you are mistaken." The confident, cool tone was eerily familiar, too, a mezzo version of Thrawn's own. "He will not walk into a trap, even with me as the bait. You would do best to let me go. Unless you plan to kill me, you have nothing to gain."

"Go where?" Ezra asked. "Back to the _Chimaera_? Don't you get it? You're free now!"

"Free?" The smile almost reached amused. "I appear to be a prisoner. You stole my shuttle, brought me here against my will, and now are unwilling or unable to let me return home. I appear to be anything but free."

"Are you crazy?"

"Ezra . . . ." Kanan, obviously, couldn't see their prisoner. He could certainly sense her, though, and his posture suggested he wasn't quite as ready to assume they'd freed an unwilling captive. "Manners."

The glowing eyes turned on him. "Kanan Jarrus. I know who you are, too. And Ezra Bridger. Garazeb Orrelios." The glowing red eyes rested on Kallus. "And I certainly know you. _Agent_ Kallus."

"That's impossible." Kallus was farther back than the others. "I have never seen you before."

"No, you have not seen me, but I have certainly seen you. Or do you think a mere ISB agent knows all the secrets of a Grand Admiral?" The smile was very thin, very cold, and eerily like Thrawn's. "Let alone those of a Chiss warrior?"

Hera's eyes had narrowed. "What are you talking about?" But the prisoner only smiled.

Kallus, meanwhile, shook his head. "Chiss is what Thrawn's species are called. They come from somewhere beyond the Outer Rim. Thrawn is the only one in the Empire's service and not even _he_ could slip a . . . civilian aboard under everyone's noses. How did he get you aboard the ship?"

"You know, worrying about that isn't your job any more," Zeb grumbled, just loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Even now you underestimate him." She sat back, not quite relaxed, but obviously a bit more confident she wasn't in immediate danger. "I realize this was likely an accident. I heard you two when you came aboard the shuttle and I know you didn't intend to take a hostage. But there's no advantage for you in it. I don't know any codes or plans that would be useful to you, and even if I did, I'd die before I told you. But as I understand your rebellion, you won't do that. You can either let me go, or I can waste a great deal of time and energy escaping myself."

Hera looked less annoyed now than confused. "You're not a member of the crew. But you're willing to die to keep Thrawn's secrets. What _are_ you?"

"Now? In this part of the galaxy?" An elegant twitch of her shoulder. "No one. I was someone once, in a place and time that has no meaning to you. Here, I am someone to only one person. A treasure, a comfort, a reminder of home." The smile prompted an absurd urge on Hera's part to cover Ezra's eyes. "Whatever is required of me."

Hera was a Twi'lek. It was impossible to be a Twi'lek and not know what that almost universally meant. "And you want to go back to that?"

There was a strange brightness to her eyes, something that made Hera take a step back. "I crossed a galaxy to find him again, Captain Syndulla. I assure you, escaping from you and finding the _Chimaera_ will be a very small task by comparison."

"And you'd do that even though you said yourself he won't try to rescue you?" Ezra said. "That doesn't sound like someone worth being loyal to you."

She blinked. "He's right. You humans do think in such very small terms. _I_ know nothing of value. If I'm lost, _he_ will suffer personally but the goal will remain intact. Conversely, he knows many things of value and has skills that are irreplaceable for the Empire and vital to the greater cause as well. He knows this and so do I. And in any case," and her eyes narrowed, "do you think that if I'm willing to give up my life to join him in your uncivilized regions, I wouldn't hesitate to die before I betray him?"

Hera stepped back further, her fists clenching. Before she could say anything, whether it was to demand further explanations or curse whatever twisted means Thrawn had used to buy this poor creature's loyalty so thoroughly, Kanan put a hand on her shoulder. "A word?"

For a moment it looked like she was going to protest, but her shouldered straightened. "A _brief_ word," she agreed, throwing another look at their prisoner before she stepped out into the gangway and waited.

Kanan moved to follow, and realized something. "You know all of our names," he said. "What should we call you?"

She ached a delicate eyebrow, a gesture he couldn't see but which matched the mental image of her emotions at his question. He'd chosen the right way to phrase it. "You may call me Lisetha," she said, though _her_ choice of phrasing made it clear that was some sort of condescension.

He nodded, and hoped Zeb and Kallus had the sense to be polite even if Ezra probably wouldn't (and that Chopper would make judicious use of his electrical probe if they didn't.) In the gangway, he didn't need sight to know that Hera had her fists on her hips and was breathing the way she did when she was trying to get that righteous temper under her control. He could sympathize, but now wasn't the time.

"She doesn't want to be here, and she wants to go back." Kanan kept his voice low. "Are we going to hold her here against her will? Or use her as a hostage and assume Thrawn won't attack as long as we have her?"

"You heard her," Hera said. "Even she isn't brainwashed enough to think he'd let us use her like that. But I'm not sending her back to be some sort of . . . _concubine_. Even if she thinks she wants that."

"She genuinely believes she wants to go back," Kanan countered. "What are we supposed to do, take her back to base and lock her up until you convince her she doesn't?"

"We should!" Hera shuddered. "There are girls like her on Ryloth–they've been toys for Imperial officers so long, they start to believe they enjoy it. Something breaks inside them. She is not a Twi'lek, but that doesn't mean I can just overlook her suffering. If she spends enough time with people who understand, and can help her see how wrong this is–"

"Hera, I can sense her feelings! She means it when she says she'll do whatever she has to do to get back to him and she considers herself our prisoner. I could tell if she was lying. She wants to go back. If we try to hold her prisoner, she'll do whatever she has to do to escape and go back to him. I know it sounds insane, but . . . she cares about him. There's more to that story she told about crossing the galaxy than she said, I can feel it. She sacrificed something big, something she doesn't think we can understand."

"Imperials don't think like that," Hera snapped. There was the faintest trace of Ryloth in her voice. "I'm not selling anyone back into Imperial slavery."

"By locking her up yourself?" Kanan shook his head. "What, are you going to ask me or Ezra to mind-trick her into cooperating next?" Some tiny shift in her sense told him that had been exactly what she'd planned to do. "Hera . . . she doesn't want to be here. If we lock her up and toy with her mind until she changes it, what does that make us?"

For a moment, Hera practically glowed with righteous anger. Then it seemed to drain away. "He doesn't deserve that kind of loyalty."

"No, he doesn't," Kanan said. "But her choices aren't ours to make. Besides, you heard Kallus. He thought Thrawn was the only one of his species in the Empire. She said they come from the Unknown Regions. I know a little bit what it's like to be the only one of my kind I can find."

"I don't like this," Hera said. "And I'm not just handing her over or letting her leave. That shuttle at least is useful and we need all the supplies we can get after what Thrawn did to us at Atollon. She'd better hope she's wrong and he _will_ make a deal for her return, or she might just have to learn to live with us after all."

Thrawn could feel his mood progressing from annoyance, to mild concern, to a very controlled sort of panic.

The rebels had clearly been startled by the _Chimaera_ 's presence in the system, but hadn't considered it a complete deterrent to their planned raid. They'd known, of course, it would take some time to recall everyone on a ship in resupply and repair to combat stations, especially during the process of taking on food and other goods. In the confusion, the rebels had damaged several docking structures, preventing the Destroyer from quickly engaging in pursuit (likely their versatile little astromech's doing, given how long it had required to fix the scrambled codes), seized at least two supply pods including one containing blaster power packs for the E-11s, and when their saboteur team had apparently been unable to regroup at their ship, some of them had stolen one the _Chimaera_ 's personnel transport shuttles docked at the station.

It was not until the Rebels had made good their escape (and a recalcitrant tractor-beam operator had been made to pay for his mistake in allowing that to happen) and Thrawn had been listening with half an ear to Captain Pellaeon's list of damaged and missing resources that it had registered exactly which shuttle the Rebels had used.

He hadn't bothered excusing himself from the bridge. Normally, he observed military courtesy in the most trying of moments, but this was a special circumstance. He checked the sensors first, the docking logs, confirming that the private clearance code had been used and the shuttle, with one passenger, had indeed left the _Chimaera_ and docked at the resupply depot. The sensors showed his quarters as empty but he searched them anyway, including the bolt hole concealed in the personal storage closet that was ray- and sensor-shielded. He'd checked the command room, his private training salon, and even the small gallery he'd created for his art when he did not require a particular piece be on display.

All empty. She had left the ship on the shuttle, and she had not returned.

And the rebels had stolen that shuttle.

"I said I require the entire station be searched under your direct supervision, Major Covell. An . . . item . . . of personal value to me has gone missing. I need to be absolutely certain that it has not fallen into Rebel hands." Strange, it was normally easier than breathing to maintain a calm, quiet tone, no matter the situation, but he found it was nearly impossible to unclench his hands from the arms of his command chair. "Captain Pellaeon, a search of the _Chimaera_ will also be conducted."

"What exactly are we searching for, Admiral?" Covell asked and Thrawn only barely contained a flinch.

"You will recognize this . . . piece . . . when you see it. It is extremely delicate, and very valuable to me." _I am never permitting this again. Allowing her off-ship even for a few minutes was a mistake. And she'll be unarmed, in the hands of rebel terrorists . . . the deathtroopers can be trusted, I'll simply need to make sure they're guarding her at all times I can't be present from now on._

 _Assuming I get her back._

"A more detailed description might–" But Pellaeon stopped himself, obviously seeing Thrawn's expression. "A full search, yes, sir."

"And no station personnel are to be involved, Major," Thrawn added to Covell. "Only Seventh Fleet." She would recognize the fleet patch, know he'd sent any searchers. If she was aboard the station, if she hadn't been aboard the shuttle attempting to return to the ship as soon as she'd realized the station was under attack.

If she wasn't already in the hands of the rebels.

It did not take as long as he felt it should for the search reports to start coming in. Nothing anomalous aboard the _Chimaera_ (but he'd known that, known if she were aboard she would be in their quarters and have no reason to hide from him), and the trooper units were rapidly running out of sectors of the depot to search. He knew, deep down, they wouldn't find her. In fact at this point he was hoping they wouldn't. If she were still aboard and uninjured, she would have contacted him to arrange a quiet return to the ship. If she were still aboard, but unable to contact him, then she was injured. Or . . . .

Thrawn prided himself on being above the kind of petty grudge-holding and personal sniping that was the downfall of so many human Imperial commanders. He had always placed Lisetha in a particular box in his mind, separate from his public role, a personal indulgence, something entirely apart and, much as he hated to use the term, alien. Personal matters that had nothing to do with his role in bringing order, stability and discipline to the galaxy.

Now, to his mild surprise, he found himself thinking of all the myriad ways he was going to rain destruction on Captain Syndulla and her merry band of terrorists if they had harmed so much as a hair on Lisetha's head. The Jedi first. If they'd taken her from him, he'd start with the Twi'lek's blind beloved and his thoroughly obnoxious apprentice. The traitor Kallus last, slowly. And Imperial allies be damned, he'd _flatten_ Mandalore just to make sure that explosives-mad little graffiti artist wasn't excluded.

Thrawn blinked, and forced himself back to the present. Perhaps he had not maintained as much detachment on the matter as he'd thought.

She was _not_ on the station. That left the stolen shuttle. If she had been able to overpower the rebels who'd commandeered it, she'd have returned by now. In the years since she'd fled Csilla in one of her family's personal craft, a reckless feat in and of itself, she'd shown a talent for flying when permitted to do so, and one of the way she amused herself during long periods of solitude was using the training programs to familiarize herself with various Imperial craft. A personnel shuttle would be no challenge. If she had not returned by now, she had been unable to regain control. Which meant she was a prisoner. A hostage.

And that left him with a serious problem.

He could not order the _Chimaera_ in pursuit of a single shuttle. Even if the raid had not done further damage that would have to be repaired, to use that level of Imperial resources would be irresponsible in the extreme and more to the point, nearly impossible to explain. He could not ask his crew to risk their lives, he could not spend Imperial resources, on what was, after all, an entirely personal quest. Never mind that would require explaining to Pellaeon, Covell, and far too many of the crew exactly what he was attempting to find.

Nor, he realized, could he simply sit and wait for Lisetha to extricate herself. While it might be inconsistent with their stated ideals and previous behavior, there was always the chance after Atollon the rebels might opt to shed some of their vaunted principles and treat prisoners with less than gracious hospitality. If they discovered what she was to him, they might even view it as personal revenge. In addition, every hour that passed meant it would be harder for Lisetha to find the ship once she did escape. She could always return to Imperial Center, but his apartments there were closed, and while she of course had access codes, it would draw the worst sort of attention from ISB on down. Or she could go to the other coordinates, the ones she knew, and Parck knew, but not only would that create a different kind of trouble in reconnecting with him, it would risk revealing _that_ particular project to the Empire at large.

He considered, for a long moment, that he might simply have to lose her. He'd done it once before. It had been no surprise that their contract was voided before it had even been finalized when he was stripped of everything that made him Chiss besides his honor and banished from the Ascendancy. It had been an arrangement of politics and logic, the affection that had developed beside the point as far as their society was concerned. Her father had done the only sensible thing upon Thrawn's disgrace and the fact he would never see her again had been only one of a long list of indignities and deprivations he'd suffered. He could hardly hold it against them. He had become a nonperson and it was far, far better for a noble's daughter who would one day wield political power herself to sever all ties to him and hope, eventually, for a more useful alliance once her embarrassment was forgotten.

Then she had appeared, tired, lost, more than a bit frightened, in his quarters on Imperial Center, having done something few of their people had ever dared of their own volition: abandoned home and family and birth status and duty to the Ascendancy and crossed known and unknown space alike. And she'd done it to find him. She had done it, knowing it doomed her to exile as surely as he was, knowing she had no status other than what his own rank might confer. And out of pure greed, he'd taken her in, made her his, and put her into more danger, out of his own selfish need and a desire he'd barely admit to himself, to have just one of their people who still believed in him.

And he'd be damned if he was going to abandon her to the rebels.

If he couldn't use all of the resources at his disposal, he would have to think unconventionally. But wasn't that, he thought as he keyed up the comm frequency for the stolen shuttle, his most valuable skill as a leader?

"A Holonet transmission?" Hera frowned, but Chopper repeated the announcement, with the inflection of his binary warbling suggesting he was questioning either her hearing or her intelligence. "From where?"

"What is it?" Kanan asked. He'd been coming into the cockpit to see if Hera's mood had improved, or if she'd made any kind of decision about what to do with their prisoner. Going back to the Yavin base was unwise until they had–if they still had Lisetha with them, she couldn't be permitted to return to the Empire with knowledge of the base's location. On the other hand, they couldn't spend much more time hiding on the abandoned asteroid mine where they'd rendezvoused to discuss what to do with their unwanted guest.. The Alliance needed the stolen supplies, and they had other missions they could be completing. And polite as she was, he had the uneasy feeling Lisetha was constantly analyzing her surroundings, and the moment any of them seemed distracted, she would make some kind of move to escape.

"Chopper says there's an incoming holonet message. It's routed to the shuttle." Hera frowned, studying the readouts. "It almost has to be an Imperial transmission. Chop, can you route it to the _Ghost?_ "

The tone of the droid's response suggested he was insulted by the implication she doubted him, and he made some adjustment to the comm system controls.

Kanan couldn't see the holographic image that appeared, but he heard Hera's sharp intake of breath, felt the surge of anger-tinged alarm, so he had a fairly good idea even before the cool, faintly alien voice spoke whose image had just appeared.

"Captain Syndulla," Thrawn said, as always with that deliberately-correct pronunciation of her name. "You have stolen something which belongs to me. I would like it back."

" _It?_ " Hera hissed. "I hope you're talking about the shuttle, Thrawn."

"You know to what I am referring. Release her or Atollon will seem like a fond encounter between friends by comparison." Something in his voice hardened. "If you have already harmed her–"

"We aren't the monsters around here, Thrawn," Hera interrupted. "Our guest is fine, except for being so brainwashed she actually wants to go back to whatever kind of slavery you've been keeping her in. And _don't_ tell me details. I don't want to know."

Thrawn's expression hardened. "I will overlook that insult, and you are certainly not entitled hear any details of our . . . arrangement. If she _is_ unharmed, I demand to see her. Now."

Hera considered that for a moment. Kanan almost suspected she was making Thrawn sweat, if his species did that. "Kanan, love, would you go tell our guest she was wrong?" She turned back to the holo. "Funny, she seemed completely convinced you'd never come for her."

It might have been a distortion from the hologam, but Thrawn flinched. "She is perhaps not the most adept at assessing her own value."

Hera paused, but shoved the thought that had intruded aside. Thrawn was an Imperial. He was not capable of sentiment or affection. "I'm sure you have that calculated down to the last credit."

Thrawn was spared from replying, not that Hera would have believed whatever excuse he made, by the sound of more than two sets of footsteps. Kanan had brought their unwanted guest, but he also had Ezra and Zeb trailing in his wake, jostling for a view even as Lisetha stopped, and just for an instant there was a flash of what might have been joy across her face. " _Thrawn!"_ That was followed by something in a mellifluous language entirely unlike anything in known space and which had just the slightest tone of protest.

Thrawn replied in kind, and Kanan, hearing only the tone, felt the disconcerting sense of the situation grow. Thrawn sounded . . . not frantic, that would be impossible, but anxious, uneasy, with anyone else Kanan would have thought desperate for reassurance. Lisetha's response certainly sounded soothing, and not the sense of someone placating a threat.

"All right," Hera said, "she's alive, and unhurt. Satisfied?"

"Not remotely," Thrawn said. "And I will not be until she is safely returned. Normally I would not be inclined to overlook your criminal activities, least of all the damage to my flagship, but under the circumstances I have no choice. Release her and for the moment, at least, I will continue to focus my efforts on other matters."

"Not so fast," Hera said. "What makes you think we're just going to let her leave?"

"First, your famous Rebel principles," and Thrawn had the tone of someone who probably had visual aides prepared to support his bullet list. "You present yourselves to the galaxy as humane, kind, unwilling to commit atrocities. Lisetha is a non-combatant. Killing her would accomplish nothing beyond striking a petty personal blow at me. Hardly the actions of noble freedom fighters attempting to liberate the innocents of the galaxy."

"Maybe we don't want your girlfriend running back to you with information about our base," Ezra said from his position behind the navigator's seat. "Just because she's not carrying a weapon doesn't mean she's not dangerous."

"Manners, Ezra Bridger," Thrawn said in a deceptively-mild tone. "And you haven't taken her to your base. If you had, I doubt very much this comm signal would still be reaching the shuttle. Your Rebel technicians would have disabled its Holonet transceivers to avoid any attempts to triangulate its location. And once you realized my _lady_ ," and there was no mistaking the emphasis on the title, "was both aboard the shuttle and unwilling to cooperate, you would have immediately gone somewhere else to prevent her acquiring that information. No, I expect you are in a system not far from Ord Trasi at all, somewhere remote, where you can decide what you consider morals suggest you do now. And you _haven't_ decided what to do, or you would be in transit. Not having this conversation. So you either have decided you can gain something from me in exchange for her safe return, or you are operating under the belief you can cure her of my so-called 'brainwashing.' That last seems fitting for someone of your background, Captain Syndulla."

Hera wasn't sure what was the most irritating–the cool, disinterested tone of his voice, as if he were delivering a lecture to cadets, the nauseatingly adoring expression on Lisetha's features, or the fact that the blue bastard had gotten so much of it _right._ "We're not just going to turn her over to you, Thrawn."

"You intend to hold her against her will?" For someone who never seemed to raise his voice, Thrawn had a way of sounding very dangerous very quickly.

"I didn't say that," Hera countered. "I have something of yours?" She glanced at Lisetha, checking, but if the objectification bothered the other woman she didn't show it. "Well, you have something of mine."

Thrawn did not need to ask. "The kalikori." He tilted his head, seeming to consider that. "One beloved family treasure for another. How . . . poetic. Very well. I am not foolish enough to think you'd come yourself. Nor that you would agree to meet at an Imperial base. You must also know I would never meet in an environment you could easily stage as a trap. Where do you propose we make the exchange?"

Hera was so startled he'd simply _agreed_ it took her a moment to pull her thoughts together. "You obviously know where Ezra's tower on Lothal is. You'll give us a proper transit code for the shuttle. Kanan, Ezra, and Zeb will fly in with Lisetha. You'll come _alone_. No support fighters, no deathtroopers, no biker scouts. Bring the kalikori. If you do that, they'll release your . . . _lady_. . . to you. You'll give them the kalikori and leave the transit code in place so they can leave. The minute you try something . . . ." Hera left the threat dangling.

"Your Jedi will kill me? Or her?" He smiled, and Hera swore to herself that one day she was personally going to wipe that smirk off his face. Ideally with her fist. "I suggest you ask Agent Kallus how easy the former is. Or what sort of pain anyone who tries the latter is likely to experience."

"Just follow my instructions and we won't have to worry about any of it," Hera countered. "Not that I wouldn't love to kill you, Thrawn, but I'm not murdering an innocent victim to do it and you have her so tied in knots she'd probably get herself killed trying to save you."

Thrawn's expression darkened, but Lisetha interrupted in that lilting language again. Her inflection suggested she was persuading and while Thrawn's expression didn't change much, some of the tension seemed to ebb away. He replied, and she smiled, lowering her eyes almost demurely. Hera fought down the urge to gag. Obviously, the Grand Admiral liked his women docile and that this one well-trained.

Thrawn clearly didn't care one way or another what Hera thought of him. "As I suspected. Very well. You have my word. No traps, and I will come alone. When do you wish to make the exchange?"

Hera paused. "The shuttle will meet you there in three standard hours, if you send the transit code now." They could actually be on Lothal in less than two, but information like that would give Thrawn that much more information to calculate where this bolt hole was.

The hologram leaned forward and did something outside their view. "Transmitting now. This code will expire in twenty-four hours, so do not expect to use it again. Three hours, Captain Syndulla. I will be waiting, alone. Thrawn out." The image shrank to a bright pinpoint of light and vanished.

Hera slumped back in her seat. The entire experience had been surreal, most of all because for a moment, in spite of knowing better, she would have sworn Thrawn was actually worried, that the anger wasn't just typical Imperial posturing. "Well, looks like you were wrong," she said, turning to Lisetha, whose mouth was barely, just barely, turned up at one corner. "He must think you're harder to replace than you do."

Lisetha twitched one shoulder in an almost-shrug. "Mitth'raw'nuruodo has always had more than a trace of sentiment in his soul. I forget sometimes how often he indulges it." If the disbelieving guffaws from Zeb or Ezra, or Hera's disbelieving stare offended her, she gave no outward indication whatsoever.

The old communication tower Ezra had once called home and which had served, briefly, as a Fulcrum transmissions tower stabbed into the bright sky of Lothal, the perfect landmark as the stolen shuttle circled, looking for the most secure place to set down. Lisetha sat, maintaining the kind of perfect facade a lifetime of training to be a highborn Chiss noble made second nature. Her hair was neatly plaited again and she'd done her best to freshen up the borrowed uniform. The amount of fussing she'd done had apparently worked, as neither of the Jedi nor the Lasat had questioned the length of time she'd spent in the shuttle's refresher. The alien guardsman and the blind Jedi had kept their opinions to themselves, but Ezra Bridger hadn't been able to hide the look of disdain mixed with pity on his face.

Well, let the human boy think what he liked. Lisetha smoothed the ugly gray material covering her legs. One thing she had _never_ worried about was what other people thought of her. Or the man she chose to love.

If her entire family disowning her barely rated a raised eyebrow, what were the bad opinions of a few rebels?

"There's another shuttle, coming in low." Garazeb Orrelios was in the copilot's seat as Bridger flew them in. Jarrus was beside her, and while she knew he couldn't see her, she had the oddest sense he was the one most closely observing her. "He must have really shown up."

"I have a bad feeling about this," Ezra said. "He's probably got a squad of those deathtroopers with him."

"He gave you his word that he would come alone," Lisetha said, not expecting them to believe her. "Therefore he will come alone. I wish he wouldn't, as I don't trust you, but he will."

"I still don't like agreeing with Kallus, but you're crazy," Ezra said. "Don't you see what he is?"

"I understand what Mitth'raw'nuruodo is better than any of you ever will," she said calmly. These rebels were worse than the Imperials in being childlike, naive, convinced this tiny corner of the galaxy was the be-all and end-all, and their worldviews absolute. "He is a warrior."

"He's tried to kill us all a hundred times," the boy retorted.

"Are you not in open rebellion against the government circumstance has brought him to serve?" she countered. "If you were not rebelling, he would pay you no mind."

"The government he serves has a habit of killing people and making them live in fear," Jarrus said. "Starting with wiping out the Jedi."

"The Jedi, yes," she said, trying to suppress a shudder at the nightmare Thrawn had described rising out of the storm on Atollon. "Rule by uses of an alleged mystic power who answer to no one and explain themselves to no one. Very reassuring, I'm sure."

"And you think living in terror is?" Bridger demanded.

"Those who embrace order, discipline, and obedience have nothing to fear," she said, though privately, she smiled at the irony. By the laws of the Ascendancy, weren't she and Thrawn the true rebels? Then she counted back to how long since she'd 'freshened up' and said, "Are you going to keep him waiting?"

"We're coming in," Bridger said. "You stay with us until we tell you. If he tries anything–"

"Ezra," Jarrus interrupted. The apprentice grimaced, but fell silent and concentrated on setting them down approximately fifty meters from where Thrawn had landed. Lisetha was on her feet before she realized it, a ghost of the same impulse that had driven her across unknown space and through alien worlds pulling her to run, even as the Lasat caught her arm and held her back, though not roughly.

Bridger and Jarrus lead the way down the ramp, blocking her view until they were dirtside. In spite of everything, her heart gave a small flutter when she saw Thrawn, his white uniform bright in the sunlight, waiting at the bottom of his own shuttle's ramp. The Twi'lek sculpture was in one hand and Lisetha felt a clench of guilt at forcing him to surrender such a treasure simply to retrieve her. His gaze, though, was fixed on her as they started toward each other across the field, though she had no doubt he was also taking in the Jedis' stances, the was the Lasat's bo-rifle was slung across his back, the speed at which they were walking, even how the light fell in case he needed to take advantage of the shadows or glare in a fight.

They stopped just ten meters apart, and for a moment, no one spoke.

Then Thrawn looked straight at her and said in Cheunh, "You are unharmed?"

"I am as well as can be expected." Theirs was a language made for understatement. "Forgive me, heart's-flame. I should never have allowed this to happen."

"Nonsense." His eyes turned to the blind Jedi. "I have what your captain wants, Kanan Jarrus. And I see you've brought what is mine."

"Someday she's going to realize what kind of person you are, Thrawn," Bridger said.

Thrawn only raised an eyebrow. "Really, Master Jedi, your apprentice's manners leave much to be desired." He raised the kalikori. "You are prepared to make the exchange?"

"Put the kalikori on the ground and back away. When Zeb and Ezra see it's undamaged, we'll let her go." The masked eyes turned to her, and she wondered if it was merely habit or some kind of Jedi senses. "When Zeb lets go, walk to Thrawn, then you both go back to his shuttle. Remember, even if I can't see you, Zeb and Ezra can. If you try anything–"

"You'll try to kill us, yes, I know," she interrupted, thinking to her mental countdown. It couldn't be long now. "Please thank Captain Syndulla for her hospitality. And though I know she won't believe you, please try to assure her this is, in fact, where I wish to be."

Jarrus nodded, though with the mask it was impossible to guess he real reaction. "Zeb, Ezra?"

"Let's go," Zeb said, nudging her forward. Thrawn had obeyed the instructions, leaving the kalikori and backing away, though not very far.

"We should probably check this for any trackers or explosives," Ezra said, keeping one eye on Thrawn as he picked up the Twi'lek sculpture and turned it over as if he had any idea what a replaced piece or secret compartment would look like.

"You have your captain's treasure," Thrawn said. "Do assure her it was a pleasure to own, even for so brief a time. Now, let. Lisetha. Go."

Lisetha pulled her arm free even before Thrawn had finished speaking, and she made it almost all the way to him before her rapid walk stumbled into a run. Thrawn closed the remaining distance and crushed her to him, practically lifting her off her feet with the possessive force of his embrace. "You came," she murmured, "you shouldn't have come. They'll try to kill you."

"Naturally," he said, as if that sort of thing happened all the time. "But you–you're unhurt? Tell me if they hurt you!" He held her out at arm's length, taking her in at once, his eyes fixing on the slight smudge of a bruise on her cheek where she'd fallen when Kallus fought off her attack. "You're bruised."

"It's nothing, dearest, but we have to go, quickly." Time was almost up, it had to be.

"What is it?" He picked up on her urgency and they were walking, faster, toward the ramp.

"Do you recall what you told me about how Captain Syndulla ended the prisoner exchange on Ryloth?"

His brow furrowed briefly.

Then he grabbed her arm and broke into a run.

They were up the ramp when they heard a muffled thud, and an alarmed roar of "KARABAST!" from the Lasat. Thrawn, of course, didn't slow down, slamming into the pilot's seat while she strapped in beside him. Through the viewport they could both see the towering white cloud of vapor rising from every vent and hatch in the stolen shuttle, the three rebels standing helplessly in front of it. Then Thrawn kicked the thrusters to full and their shuttle ran for open space. He focused on flying until they cleared the gravity well for a safe jump to hyperspace, then said, with his usual calm, "Korfaise gas?"

"They let me use the 'fresher to straighten up a bit," she said, feeling the exhausted lassitude begin to seep through her as the reality that she was safe and on her way home sank in. "In that model shuttle, the coolant recycling system runs under the deck plates in the lower-compartment fresher, so I managed to pry up the plates and thread one of the power conduit filaments into a join in the pipes. I estimated it would take approximately forty minutes to burn through the seal and release the coolant gas at that power level. It's lighter than air, so even if I'd overestimated we would have been able to escape the toxic fumes, and either way, the shuttle won't fly."

"Denying the Rebels once prize of their theft, at least temporarily, though sadly they'll have likely fled to the Lothal cell before a scout party arrives from the garrison to investigate the cloud." Thrawn smiled, more to himself than at her. "Destroying their spoils, escaping cleanly, alerting the garrison, and all without me having to break my word. A shame you were born to politics. What a warrior you would have been."

"We're hardly bound by our birth here," she said, moving to unbuckle the restraining harness. "Perhaps when it's finally safe to have a child, he'll inherit a talent for both."

"Or she," Thrawn corrected. Lisetha started to rise from the co-pilot's seat, but he was quicker, putting a restraining hand on her shoulder. "For now, though, you have had a very trying day." He turned the seat around so he had plenty of room to lean down over her, his fingers slowly undoing the crew jumpsuit. "And _I_ am not going to be satisfied you are truly uninjured until I have personally inspected every square centimeter of your body. Please don't make me force you to cooperate."

"You deliberately plotted a course that will take longer than necessary, didn't you?" she sighed, squirming to let him pull the jumpsuit down her upper body.

"Perhaps," he said. "Especially now that you've made sure the rebels will be occupied, I need time for a very thorough inspection indeed. I'm sure that never occurred to you when you were planning your distraction that I might require such time?"

"Perhaps," she replied, and forgot about the rebels as she submitted to a very, very thorough inspection indeed.


End file.
